It's all too much

[Sadly]

I may have to swear off Trading Spouses and just stick to the gentle insanity of Big Brother. TS is too real, too close to the raw bone of human nature to enjoy as "hey, look at the geeks!" entertainment. The producers are very skilled at showing us just how pitiful these people are, without blurring the ugly edges. I've noticed that I am more than slightly depressed at the end of every episode because, as the show makes clear, most people are a huge disappointment to both themselves and to everyone else.

I thought no one could make me feel worse than Tammy Nakamura, the smug, self-righteous b*tch willing to exploit her own mother-in-law. This upper-middle class fraud needs to be slapped at least once by every TS viewer. I would watch the Slap Tammy Show for an hour a week for the rest of my life.

The Cooke and Levine families have made Tammy irrelevant. Poor self-conscious Jay Cooke, overcome at the meaningless of life at the Levine's, connects with the emotionally starved children and tries to comprehend the behavior of their manic mother. He pines for his simple country life with Brandi, his clinically depressed, misshappenly overweight wife, and his two seriously disturbed children who commit everyday atrocities on each other and the livestock. Does Jay long for the sweet release of death, as I do just watching him? He does not. He will suffer for another 50 years and never know true happiness, until he draws his last breath. Jay, do not waste a moment feeling badly that you misspent the Levine's $50K. The callous lawyer and his grasping wife will do just fine. Their children will bury both of them before they reach 50, and then go on to ruin the lives of their spouses, who had no warning of the childhood abuse that they are doomed to perpetuate.

Or, it could be that I am reading too much into all this and that TS is just another silly foray into TV "reality." I doubt it. Right now, Brandi is sitting on her couch, slackjawed, watching her kids kill each other, while Jay crouches on the porch watching the ill-made door of the chicken coop swing back and forth in the breeze. I wish I'd never met any of them.

Sadly

[EVOO]

It's watching a trainwreck- I don't think it's stooping to any new low we haven't seen from any other show...I mean, there are WORSE shows out there. (I'm channeling The Littlest Groom.)

As a TV viewer, if we don't like it, it's as simple as turning the channel.

I wasn't really depressed by it, rather really frustrated by some aspects of the show.

[Xantham Gum]

I thought you were just going to bemoan the scheduling conflict of Big Brother 5 and The Amazing Race coming on at the same time as both Trading Spouses episodes (and Last Comic Standing too, plus the new season of Real World will be on during that time starting next week) and how it was all "too much" to watch.

I agree, it can be a sad exercise guessing which family will be the more dysfunctionally condemned to an inevitable future wrought from the present we are now witness to, but heck, it doesn't have to be all bad. I know that I watch it with both my kids and always end up praising them afterwards for not being anything like those on TV and they usually say the same about their parents so it can also be either a consolation of knowing there are worse families than yours or a valuable learning tool to correct any behavior that you might find too uncomfortably similar to your own.

[did_it_again]

Dude ,your reading way to much into it. The last time i was sad after watching a reality tv show is when it was over 'cuz I wanted more; not because i took what I saw to heart. Realax dude and drink a beer ,eat some nachos and just be thankful Tammy doesn't live in your crib.

[just1paul]

Actually Tammy turned out to be a very thoughtful woman, as to what the $$ went for. Now the Biggins family is gettin all done over... Hope they can pay the taxes on all of the stuff and their new property appraisal...

[ness]

Now the Biggins family is gettin all done over... Hope they can pay the taxes on all of the stuff and their new property appraisal...

That thought crossed MY mind, too.

[mrjunior]

I just have to get this in- Tammy was, is and NEVER will be thoughtful.... what she was doing was merely following the show's rules. you didn't think mr biggins is stupid enough to know better and making sure SHE DARN WELL KNOWS what his family's financial situation is all about during her little TS adventure, did you?

As for the tax issue, i'm sure they're well taken care of.... even if FOX stupidly omit that part on their "contract" I think the 50 grand winnings from TS will be more than enough to pay for the any new tax expenses. no worries there.

but getting back on topic, sadly, i too think with the rest of the posters here that you are reading a bit too much into it as well. I mean other than Lisa Bowers, i think Tammy still reigns as one of the top all-time villianness of TS, if not the history of reality tv. Neither the cookes or levines come close (kids don't count since they are afterall kids). Still there is some truth in your quaint but honest assessment of mr cooke and his life experiences which i do share your sympathy with. However, i have a harder time to subscribe to your theory about the levines. it was, you must admit, rather harsh and uncalled for but don't get me wrong, i do respect your opinion and you have every right to say it but watching the two hour long episode i just don't see any evidence of a bleak destiny that you described of the levine's future. i mean the levine mom was frankly being what a mom is.... so she is a bit more of a control freak than your average mother but she's no tammy nakamura or lisa bowers. that's a fact. she was nice to her guest at least and how she treats her own family isn't unusual either.... or at least it wasn't as serious as "abuse" (like you suggested, not even close) in fact it's hard to know exactly what the relationship between the levine parents and the kids are..... perhaps the levine kids do look up to their dad and love him dearly and vice versa. In the span of a very brief window of viewing time, i can't say for certain what exactly is the truth about the levine's parental skills. what i do know at least is their skills are MUCH better than the cooke's for sure.

[Sadly]

Believe me, I know that it is bad form to take these shows too seriously. My own family members shake their heads at me when I get glum after watching Maury parade his misfits in front of the camera and then pretend that he is helping them. I haven't learned the trick of treating these people merely as images on the screen. But, hey, if you can't take it, don't watch, right? And sometimes nothing feels better than feeling miserable. Trading Spouses scratches that itch just right.

Sadly

[did_it_again]

........ Drink more beer

[happydude]

........ Drink more beer

Alcohol is a depressant....next time you sit down in front of the telly, make sure your bong is in easy reach.